From: Gary Mongiovi (MONGIOVG@STJOHNS.EDU)
Date: Sat Oct 20 2007 - 13:52:00 EDT
To Anders: I'm curious--what do you find objectionable about my RRPE paper? I concede that it is highly critical of TSSI, and that it expresses its disagreement in strong terms. But when I was writing it I tried very hard to address issues of substance in a careful & respectful way. In the end I found no merits in the position I was critiquing: but does that in itself mean that I was not constructively engaging with the TSSI position? Gary -----Original Message----- From: OPE-L on behalf of Anders Ekeland Sent: Sat 10/20/2007 1:31 PM To: OPE-L@SUS.CSUCHICO.EDU Cc: Subject: Re: [OPE-L] Incoherence of the TSSI - consensus? Mohun wrote: >Not Gary Mongiovi, but Simon Mohun. Yes, but I wrote purposely Mongiovi. I do not see his: "Vulgar economy in Marxian garb: a critique of Temporal Single System Marxism." as a role model for really engaging with people with other points of view. Veneziani followed up this in a contribution to the 2006 AHE conference, better in style, but still just the type of "polemics" that we all know to well in the seventies. >And you are not quite right - it is because Roberto and I do not find >the "reclaiming Marx" exercise convincing that we are not willing to >accept what you call its "very limited claims". I have not read your and Roberto's article, so I cannot comment on that one in particular. My point was that Kliman and Freeman is no worse in reporting - and trying to understand the motives of people with whom they disagree than Mongiovi and Veneziani whom I have read. I was addressing Jerry's call for a vote, not directly the real issues involved. >>The limits to the TSSI, i.e. that it is not a real positive theory, >>i.e. a model that shows how capitalism works, are not recognized, >>because the Sraffa model is of course even more totally unreal >>(nothing changes). > >The TSSI has nothing to say about how capitalism actually works - that >is not its avowed purpose. [Since most of my own work is about how >capitalism actually works, engaging with the TSSI is singularly >frustrating.] Since we agree here, and this point is very clearly stated by A.F and A.K - so why be frustrated? Why just drop the debate about if Marx is internally consistent? That debate is only interesting as part of a hegemonic debate - which is very important from a political point of view. But from a view of how capitalism does work, whether the important results that Marx thought he had elaborated are true the "reclaiming debate" is not the one that is going to give us the positive theory, the real restatement of the essence of Marx' project. To take an example: Although I disagree with Rosdolsky on several points on how capitalism actually works, and where I think Marx (and Rosdolsky) were/are wrong/fragmentary/limited by the historical experiences with capitalism so far etc. - I really feel that Rosdolsky understands Marx, that his interpretation is in Marx' spirit, that if Marx and Rosdolsky met they would have had long, fruitful exchanges of views. When reading Steedman, Elster, Roemer - I do not get that feeling at all. I think Marx very quickly would have gotten very irritated by the fundamentally static, un-dialectic approach of the linear-algebraic method - and had no sympathy at all for this type of "corrections" - not at all understanding why the equality of profit and surplus value, of total value and total prices are absolutely necessary invariants if you are going to explain labour(time) as the source(measure) of value. >>As I have said before it is an open question to me if one can make an >>static equilibrium model of capitalism that is interesting. > >You can find my own approach in > >"A Re(in)statement of the Labour Theory of Value". Cambridge Journal of >Economics 18(4), 1994: 391-412 > >"Does All Labour Create Value?", pp. 42-58 in A. Saad-Filho (ed.), >Anti-Capitalism: a Marxist Introduction. London: Pluto Press, 2003 > >"On Measuring the Wealth of Nations: the U.S. Economy, 1964-2001". >Cambridge Journal of Economics 29(5), 2005: 799-815 > >"Distributive Shares in the U.S. Economy, 1964-2001". Cambridge Journal >of Economics 30(3), 2006: 347-70 Thanks for very useful references! Regards Anders
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